1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to cotton ginning and more particularly to press dogs at the press wherein the cotton is compressed, wrapped and tied.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Traditionally, after the cotton has been processed at a gin, it is tramped into a press box. Two press boxes are mounted upon a turntable. When a bale of cotton is tramped into one press box, the turntable is rotated, bringing an empty box to the tramper. The box containing a full bale of cotton is brought over a hydraulic press ram wherein the bale of cotton is pressed into the upper portion of the box. The top of the box is then broken open and the wrapping and tying of the bale is completed.
Dogs are used in the upper portion of the box so that each stroke or each time the cotton is tramped down in the press box, the dogs engage the top of the cotton to prevent the cotton from expanding and following the tramper back up. Then when the turntable is rotated and the cotton is pressed, it is necessary to pull the dogs from the box to permit the cotton to expand up to the top of the press.
Traditionally, these dogs have "fingers" which extend through slots in the side of the box to engage the cotton. Each dog, besides the fingers, has a weight which, by gravity, tends to flip the dog in a horizontal position. The action is that when the tramper pushes down upon the cotton, the dogs are pushed down and then when the tramper passes by, the weights push the fingers back to horizontal position and the weights bear against the side of the box to prevent the fingers from rising or flipping up. Then, when the box is moved by the turntable to the press position, a common eccentric shaft or common crankshaft carrying all the dogs is rotated to remove the dogs from an engaged position so the fingers are withdrawn from the box, permitting the cotton to rise.
Of course, there have been variations of this. E.g., from about 1935 to about 1950 the Murray Company, Dallas, Texas, marketed a Down Packing Double Box Press. The cotton was tramped downward and, also, the cotton was pressed downward. The bottom of the press box opened for wrapping and tying the bale and removing it. In this case, it was necessary only for the dogs to hold the cotton down inasmuch as the press block moved downward as well as the tramper. Therefore, they were able to use dogs each of which were individually mounted to the side of the box.
AUSTIN et al., U.S. Pat. No. 2,822,750, discloses a press box wherein each of the dogs is mounted on a straight shaft and the shaft mounted by a short crank arm to another straight shaft and the two shafts held so the dogs are engaged by springs. The dogs were all mounted on a common shaft and upon release, the dogs all acted in unison.
TATE, U.S. Pat. No. 1,726,935, discloses a similar system wherein all of the dogs are on a common a shaft and instead of using a weight to flip the springs, he uses a spring. TATE discloses two springs, one for operating in each direction for the entire series of dogs for one side.
BLEWETT, U.S. Pat. No. 2,139,928, discloses a plurality of dogs, all the dogs being attached to a single shaft and the shaft controlled by a single spring acting against a cam follower. A special shaped cam on the shaft controlled the dogs in the desired manner.
DEEMS, U.S. Pat. No. 2,757,601, discloses a system having a plurality of dogs on a single shaft and operating with either a spring system or hydraulic system.
In addition to the above mentioned patents, applicant was familiar at the time of the preparation of this patent application with the two VanDOORN patents, U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,583,312 and 3,796,150; the DOLAN patent, U.S. Pat. No. 962,555; TAYLOR U.S. Pat. No. 3,195,447, and BLEASDALE U.S. Pat. No. 3,882,770.
In recent times, there have been developments which had made it desirable to change the size of the press boxes that existed in may gins. This has necessitated in changing the press dogs.